Dark Off
I am still in the old dingy neighborhood,
waiting for the skies to turn into cashmere.
Ice-cream trucks play baroque symphony,
and the brown kids outside chase each other
in the dark with some whizzing lightsabers.
If I try to fry something I will eventually burn it,
and the avant-garde words from Cummings’s “is 5”
crumble down on the wine stained carpet.
I attentively prowl the streets late at night,
stalking the shadows that are drawing nearer.
Concealing myself in the Serbian liquor store,
where the celluloid shop boy sells me bottles
full of canned laughter. It will be like this
until the end – eventually – no coke or grass,
just this indescribable mouth in my head,
lisping in my good ear “Times must pass”.
Recognition
Right here the pages of the sea resemble an open book
of fairy tales forgotten by a child on the beach
and just before the sunset I look at the horizon’s edge
getting cut up by the sharp wings of the seagulls and
the white moon slowly rises with its pale gray halo
and stars like fireflies are dotting the dark forest
under the sky which, once more, invoke old memories
of intangibility and eternity.
I stand as a rock, nothing else stirs, not even the air,
only the cold sea folds like a galvanized iron sheet,
the black fists of the clouds gather over this part of the hemisphere,
where my life runs like a brook into the ocean and I suddenly
discover that my childhood is already gone, the boats have
sailed off and my life – it’s too early for last words – is a door
made of flesh, opening even more, it’s a knife driven in
the bowels of the hours, it’s the last page of the memorized Iliad.
All of a sudden the wind explodes as a curse shaking the crowns
of the impressive trees, sprinkling grit as musical notes on
the staff of the beach, sweet music starts ringing in my ears,
unheard by anyone else – slow and eternal – at this place,
where nothing changes, only time is replaced with another
fresh time and silence absorbs all unnecessary sounds.
The sunrise arrives with the precision of early-rising surgeon,
cutting the flesh, first of the water, then of the land, the sun
ignites the surroundings with its bright impressionistic brush
and the whole world inhales again with ancient lungs.
Death is a panacea for everything that wants to live ceaselessly,
life again begins its development from the world’s threshold,
where the humans reappear with their strange faces and
contrived monologues, preparing once again to screw up
all the works.
The Undeserved
The crows become slightly restless as darkness approaches
the feathers fill with pain
silence and air-sucking trees
but at the unexpected clearing the moon illuminates a circle of joy
over me
please go away this was never mine
not ever again
About the Author
Peycho Kanev is the author of 10 poetry collections and three chapbooks, published in the USA and Europe. His poems have appeared in many literary magazines, such as: Rattle, Poetry Quarterly, Evergreen Review, Front Porch Review, Hawaii Review, Barrow Street, Sheepshead Review, Off the Coast, The Adirondack Review, Sierra Nevada Review, The Cleveland Review and many others. His new book of poetry titled A Fake Memoir was published in 2022 by Cyberwit.
